› Forums › Geocaching in Wisconsin › General › Find some positives….
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Northwoods Tom.
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08/29/2011 at 8:16 pm #1732477
Things seem to have been kind of negative around here lately. So, to try and reverse that trend, share a positive about the game. There have been some awesome posts like that in the past. I can think of a couple, one by One Paddle Short and one by Braid Beard, sharing what they’ve discovered as a family out exploring by way of geocaching.
One liners, essays, doesn’t matter. Tell us something GOOD about the hobby you’ve experienced. If you love getting power trails with friends, that’s great. If hiking miles into Eagle Source is your thing, great. We’ve been known to do both approaches. Save the “WE don’t do it that way” kind of comments for someplace else, okay? Even better, just enjoy what you do and let others do the same…. 😯
One thing that always strikes me about geocaching is the fact that there is such a mix of people from across society. Where else can a group get together that includes teenagers, attorneys, retired CEOs, family groups and regular working stiffs, and there’s a common base? It just does not happen very many places in society, and I think it adds a dimension of richness for us. I just finished reading a book called “Being Wrong,” and one of the over-riding themes of how stuck we can get in our thinking is the fact we just don’t get other points of view, because of this stratification. A side benefit as we’ve come to know many of you is that we DO get to take on the many points of view about many topics because of this group diversity.
08/29/2011 at 9:09 pm #1952710yesterday my 4 year old son, Ryan asked to go caching with me. Now he had only done a couple caches with me, mostly at the RAC picnic last year but really enjoyed the experience, so, who am I to deny such a request. the nearest caches to me that I haven’t found were all pretty much P&Gs but that didn’t make the adventure any less of a thrill for Ryan. One spot was a DNR land parking area. What excitement could there be there???
Big ol’ Grasshoppers!!! that engrossed him for the time we were there. Next stop, was a matchstick container in a tree. next to a river – still pretty cool to him. Last stop, signpost. across the street – one of his favorite things in the world– train tracks!! anything trains he just loves. No trains running on Sunday but when asked later what the best thing was, it was the train tracks. Oh, to be able to really enjoy the simple things is something to behold in a child. they grow up so fast.thanks T&B for scaring away the bad vibes and allowing me to change my focus to the positive side!
Looking forward to following this thread, may it exceed the posts in threadstealers.Disclaimer : Always answering to a higher power.
08/29/2011 at 9:44 pm #1952711What do you mean we grow up? The highlight of my weekend caching was when I got to drive my old truck through mud puddles!
On the Left Side of the Road...08/29/2011 at 9:46 pm #1952712Yeah really, another positive is the fact we have sanctioned childishness while searching for some of this stuff! Not that many other opportunities for an over the hill grandma to climb trees to take one for the team.
08/29/2011 at 10:40 pm #1952713Birdin, nice idea. I’ve thought the same thing lately. I tried to post a positive the other day in the missing answers thread but no one seemed to notice. I’ve got lots of positives to share.
First, it’s been a great way for our family to get up and get going outside. My kids have been to some great places and have learned so much about the great outdoors. They’ve learned to be more considerate of the environment and have become more adventurous. I am making a quilt for my son for his birthday and he says he only wants me to use fabrics that involve nature. How sweet!
Second, I have struggled with my weight for a very long time. In the past year I have managed to lose a lot of weight. I mean, a LOT! There were several contributing factors to this but one of them was that I have tried to get a little more strenuous with my exercising. I’ve used geocaching to help me make that fun. And making it fun has helped me stick to it and not make excuses. I even did hiking in the winter, something I didnt do before. I’m not quite to my goal yet but I’m getting close. I plan on continuing to motivate myself to keep losing and then maintaining my weight with caching.
I’ve made some new friends while caching. That’s been fun. It’s so great to connect with other people who share my love of the outdoors. I look forward to meeting even more people.
I also really enjoy getting logs on my caches. Well, ok, not so much the TFTC’s, those are pretty much meaningless. But sometimes I get a log really makes my day. I love going back and reading the logs and hearing about other cacher’s experiences. I usually get the best logs on my earth caches. Just the other day I got a log from someone who had been unexpectedly pleased at Cave of the Mounds, staying an extra day in the area. And it was my cache that had brought them there! It gave me warm fuzzies!
Well, I could probably go on and on but I’ll quit now. Now let’s hear some more stories!
Not all who wander are lost. -J.R.R. Tolkien
08/30/2011 at 3:38 am #1952714Never met a cacher I didn’t like . . .
Seriously, we have yet to run into a bad apple in the bunch.
We bumped into others on the trail, we’ve attended events and we communicate with others via email. The common thread is that all cachers we’ve had the pleasure to meet are totally awesome people.
We’ve also noticed is that when geocachers are together, it’s like a cocktail party without the cocktails. Conversations erupt, morph and meld as people join a group, kibitz and then skip away to join another nearby geocaching-driven conversation. The conversations are always passionate about the hobby/sport we all enjoy. Never a dull moment. Never a lack of geo-thing-a-ma-jiggers to compare notes on.
Always Happy Trails for us . . .
08/30/2011 at 3:48 am #1952715OK Gwyn, here’s one you will appreciate. We took our almost 4 year old grandson Ryan to the WGA Pancake Breakfast in West Bend. After the breakfast we went over to the Eisenbahn Trail with him to hunt a few easy ones on the paved trail. The first one he found by himself cleverly hidden while I was on my knees looking in the wrong spot. Another .15 down the trail I grabbed the large ammo box from under the bridge and brought it up onto the trail for him to go through. He was astonished that people would just leave all of this good stuff out here ( he took refrigerator magnets ). Started heading for home, but stopped to let him find one more, a PnG that we had found the day before. It was a strange object completely in plain sight, but his geo-senses were in high gear and he walked right up to it and popped it open. We had to head home now for his little brother’s 2 year old birthday party, but he was OK with that. He told us he had just had “his best day ever”.
08/30/2011 at 1:47 pm #1952716A positive? My last 30 days page is not full of notes! it actually has some caches on it!
Seriously, just have not had time or funds to do a caching “day” like I used to. Caching has been a “oh one is 258 feet from the gas station on the way to grandma’s house!” vs a “there’s 227 on the way to grandma’s!”.
To a degree this has been some of the best caching I’ve done because its almost like starting over. The thrill of the find is back so to speak.
I’d still love a day of “Coon Fork” caches, or 40 + with a group, but have to take what I can get for now.
08/30/2011 at 2:30 pm #1952717I’ve used the sport to get me out doing something different this summer. I’ve teamed up and also soloed a number of water based caches via canoe and kayak.
Some were relatively easy and some were not. In the end though it’s been a great experience getting off the beaten trail (literally) and experiencing nature and the outdoors from a unique vantage point. One of the most memorable was paddling down the Wolf River with a group of 3 others and having an eagle blazing the trail ahead of us for a period of time.
08/30/2011 at 2:59 pm #1952718I was in the Wausau area yesterday for a meeting, and decided to do some caching in the afternoon. My plan was to find three in the Weston area, then head over to Rib Mountain to do 5 more to make it to my 1900 milestone. Well I DNF’d one of the ones in Weston, then the third one was in David Cantrell’s front yard. When I left DC’s and headed toward Rib Mt. I forgot that the ramp for 39 north was closed, so I adjusted my plan and headed to Mosinee. I passed on two caches because it was getting late and I had work to do at home, and ended up at Sparky Finds 1000! (GC31Q01).
As I walked the 1/4 mile out to the cache, I was thinking about what a nice area this was. It’s a shame that I don’t ever come out here just for a walk. I’ll have to start doing that. Then, after finding the cache … one short of my goal for the day … I started walking back to the truck and thoughts of the cachers I’ve met on these trails. My first time visiting the Sandy Creek area I met Brian from TBC and Rsplash40 and shared an FTF with them. We spent the next couple hours caching together, and I learned a lot from them that day.
On my next trip to Sandy Creek I met Mindy and Corazon from conejo rojo. I had Dakota, my geolab with me, so the four of us headed off down the trail together. We spent a couple hours finding caches and chatting.
Sparky put out a couple more caches in the Sandy Creek area later, and I returned to find them. On this visit I met tbutter and KellyLea. I was done and on my way back to the truck, so we only got to talk for a few minutes.
As I rounded the final bend in the trail before I got back to the truck, I spotted a woman with a dog up ahead. As I approached, a man stepped out from behind a group of trees, staring at a GPSr. Stopped and chatted with Jawbreakers for a few minutes before I headed for home and they headed out onto the trail.
Every time I’ve visited the Sandy Creek area, I’ve run into someone else out there geocaching and enjoying the beauty of the area.
All opinions, comments, and useless drivel I post are mine alone and do not reflect the opinions of the WGA BOD.
08/30/2011 at 3:25 pm #1952719Every September my Wife and I go to her hometown in the U.P. for a fall camping trip with her family. Last year when we were there we took her two Nephews out caching or (treasure hunting). We let them make all the finds by dirrecting them to the right locations. We also let them take turns by swaping out treasures in each cache. We all had so much fun and by the end of the day they were both pretty tired out. Recently her one nephew came down for our wedding and when I asked him what he wanted to do, he said go treasure hunting.. Future cacher? I am not sure but he sure had fun last summer. 😀
08/31/2011 at 1:16 am #1952720A couple of recent positives for us.
During the cache ba$h we lost our blue bag that had 2 recently purchased coins. A couple from Michigan had accidently picked it up during the heavy rains on Saturday while we were all huddled underneath the shelter. After several posts both here and on the cache page we figured out where our coins went and arranged for them to be returned. We received them last Wednesday.
The second positive was a recent Saturday evening when the wife and I were on our laptops getting ready for a caching trip with Scrappy Scout to the West Bend area. As I prepared the pocket query for download my phone starts making the sound it does when I get an email. What was strange about this was that it didn’t stop chiming for almost a minute! When I opened my email I was treated to a list of 26 newly published caches!!
This was around 11:00pm at night so we decided to quickly finish up what we were doing and get to bed. We woke up at 3:00am, loaded the GPSr and ran out the door. For the morning we found all 26 caches, ended up with 12 FTF’s, and had one of the best caching days we have had in a long time.
The afternoon we spent caching with our best buds Kevin & Meg (Scrappy Scout) down in a West Bend.
08/31/2011 at 1:26 am #195272108/31/2011 at 4:47 pm #1952722The most recent wonderful experiences… So many! Here’s two. August 27th I was out grabbing a few caches, and on one, an older gentleman came up to my vehicle as I was checking out the next cache on my laptop. Looking at me with a gruff expression, I quickly rolled down the window and introduced myself and explained what I was doing. The frown softened a bit. We continued to visit and talk, he told me about his family, his wife and her stroke, problems, his worries, many subjects. After at least a half hour of visiting, he was grinning and smiling, and we shook hands and wished each other well as we moved on. Taking that small amount of time out of my day, I believe made his day a little bit better. A simple park and grab made it possible. Two caches latter, I was rewarded with acres of the most beautiful landscape of flowering plants at another cache.
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